Level 7

APRIL 11

Am I capable, or am I not capable, of pitying other people? Am I, or am I not able to develop a genuine friendship, to love somebody, to care for another person with all my heart?

This business has been plaguing me since yesterday. I do not want to be a monster, and a man without emotions is a monster. What is the difference between me and an electronic brain? It can calculate far better, work more efficiently; it makes no mistakes. It cannot get fond of anybody. Neither can I.

But I can pity myself and torment myself, and an electronic gadget cannot do that. There’s the difference.

Level 7. The unsocial society. Community of self-pitying gadgets, hive of monsters.

Are we really monsters, or merely miserable creatures who deserve pity? There I go—self-pity again! But I did say ‘are we’, which may be evidence of sociability in me after all.

How deep does it go? Oh, I wish I could stop fretting about it. If I were a real machine I should be much happier.

A happy gadget! I had better stop writing for today and listen to some music, if all I can produce is such absolute nonsense. Perhaps I am heading for a nervous breakdown myself.

Something for the psychologists to think about: Can a man become neurotic through worrying about his inability to be neurotic?